The Linux Questions Thread: a bunch of pitfalls, but technically it's possible

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Linux Questions Thread: a bunch of pitfalls, but technically it's possible

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Al Azif: Nov 1, 2006

Is Matroska (.mkv) just a really CPU-heavy format? I can never get them to play correctly; in mplayer the audio is always out of sync and in vlc the video is unwatchably choppy.

This is on a 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo, which should be more than fast enough to play a video (right?).

# ? Jun 21, 2007 15:08

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# ? Apr 24, 2024 00:19

Combat Pretzel: Jun 23, 2004; No, seriously... what kurds?!

I'm currently trying to compile Thunderbird for my system, because I need to do this to actually build goddamn Enigmail.

Anyhow, I downloaded the source of release 2.0.0.4, yet this build script requires CVS, to update exactly nothing, apart from downloading two Makefiles that for some reason weren't included. What's the loving point of this :psyduck:

poo poo? I couldn't find an explanation for this anywhere.

# ? Jun 21, 2007 15:34

yippee cahier: Mar 28, 2005

Toiletbrush posted:

I'm currently trying to compile Thunderbird for my system, because I need to do this to actually build goddamn Enigmail.

Anyhow, I downloaded the source of release 2.0.0.4, yet this build script requires CVS, to update exactly nothing, apart from downloading two Makefiles that for some reason weren't included. What's the loving point of this poo poo? I couldn't find an explanation for this anywhere.

What distro are you using that doesn't have a package manager?

# ? Jun 21, 2007 16:22

Combat Pretzel: Jun 23, 2004; No, seriously... what kurds?!

Solaris Express.

And I don't see what a package manager has to do with it (it has one). There are no Enigmail plugins for Thunderbird 2.0 on Solaris x86. A plugin which is a binary module. I have to compile the whole Mozilla poo poo first, then install the Enigmail source and compile that. I don't get why this can't be done in JavaScript, XUL and whatever else, but there don't seem to be any other options to tie GnuPG into Thunderbird.

Anyway, why do I actually download a specific version source tarball, which is then incomplete and needs to fetch more poo poo via cvs (the Makefiles), if those files aren't expected to be changed, and then spends lots of time updating the source tree, resulting in exactly no updates.

As you can guess, I meanwhile aborted the whole deal, sticking with Evolution some more. I guess until someone releases some Solaris x86 plugins. However would I like to know what all this :psyduck:

stuff is about. Back then, when I used to compile Firefox 1.0, I didn't have to deal with such nonsensical things.

--edit: spelink

Combat Pretzel fucked around with this message at 19:23 on Jun 21, 2007

# ? Jun 21, 2007 19:20

Tracer Tong: Jul 7, 2003; You know, it's hard work to try to love her as best as I can, knowing full well that the decision I made caused her loved one to be in harm's way.

I recently (last few months) purchased a Dell Inspiron 1501 for notes in class and general tomfoolery. Just after said purchase, Dell announced cooperation with Canonical's Ubuntu, and are now offering it as an OS for some of their products. While they do not offer Linux as an option for my particular item, I was wondering if anyone knew if such support would be available in the future (Dell native support for the various keyboard func keys and perhaps not having to use ndiswrapper).

Thanks!

# ? Jun 21, 2007 19:56

dfn_doe: Apr 12, 2005; I FOR ONE WELCOME OUR NEW STUPID FUCKING CATCHPHRASE OVERLORDS

Tracer Tong posted:

I recently (last few months) purchased a Dell Inspiron 1501 for notes in class and general tomfoolery. Just after said purchase, Dell announced cooperation with Canonical's Ubuntu, and are now offering it as an OS for some of their products. While they do not offer Linux as an option for my particular item, I was wondering if anyone knew if such support would be available in the future (Dell native support for the various keyboard func keys and perhaps not having to use ndiswrapper).

Thanks!

Dell offers no software support for ubuntu installed systems, only hardware support. At least that is what their site was saying last I looked.

# ? Jun 21, 2007 20:16

decypher: Aug 23, 2003; Who else see da leprechaun say yaaaa!

After reading a thread about PCLinuxOS I downloaded and installed it on my laptop and my main computer. It's been a wonderful experience on my laptop, much like my desktop experience, except for one small thing.

I left my desktop on over night and when I came back this morning my sound didn't work. I logged out, logged back in, same story. I rebooted and logged in, same thing, sound is still not working.

I ran some of the cmdl tools in the troubleshooting and all seemed to be normal. I don't remember the commands off the top of my head but one checked which driver I was using, one checked the volume and if it was muted accidently, and all seemed normal.

What would be the next step in trouble shooting the problem?

Remember, the sound worked absolutely fine from the first boot of the LiveCD even before I installed. So this is strange.

EDIT:

I was able to answer my own question. I ran alsaconf and everything worked okay after that. I am new to linux so this is exciting.

decypher fucked around with this message at 21:05 on Jun 21, 2007

# ? Jun 21, 2007 20:17

Twlight: Feb 18, 2005; I brag about getting free drinks from my boss to make myself feel superior; Fun Shoe

At work we have alot of systems, and since these systems are referenced by ip address mostly (due to snort's web frontend) I was thinking of creating a local whois server just so BASE can interface with it. Whats the quickest way to go about this in linux.

# ? Jun 22, 2007 21:35

JoeNotCharles: Mar 3, 2005; Yet beyond each tree there are only more trees.

Twlight posted:

At work we have alot of systems, and since these systems are referenced by ip address mostly (due to snort's web frontend) I was thinking of creating a local whois server just so BASE can interface with it. Whats the quickest way to go about this in linux.

Uh, what exactly do you need from the whois server? If you have the name and want the IP, you need DNS server. If you have the IP and want the name, you need reverse DNS. whois won't help you - it just tells you who's registered a domain name.

# ? Jun 22, 2007 21:56

Twlight: Feb 18, 2005; I brag about getting free drinks from my boss to make myself feel superior; Fun Shoe

JoeNotCharles posted:

Uh, what exactly do you need from the whois server? If you have the name and want the IP, you need DNS server. If you have the IP and want the name, you need reverse DNS. whois won't help you - it just tells you who's registered a domain name.

drat, you know I knew that my question sounded odd, I guess I need reverse dns but I found some articles that allows me to do that. sorry about the mix up.

# ? Jun 22, 2007 22:00

crazysim: May 23, 2004; I AM SOOOOO GAY

Al Azif posted:

Is Matroska (.mkv) just a really CPU-heavy format? I can never get them to play correctly; in mplayer the audio is always out of sync and in vlc the video is unwatchably choppy.

This is on a 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo, which should be more than fast enough to play a video (right?).

MKV is just a container. People usually use it for its multiple subtitle support. For the video, a wide array of formats could be in it.

# ? Jun 22, 2007 22:41

Rapsey: Sep 29, 2005

Why does the KSysGuard taskbar applet display 100% CPU, when running top only shows a couple of apps with 1-5% CPU?

# ? Jun 23, 2007 12:50

thenameseli: Sep 6, 2006

Al Azif posted:

Is Matroska (.mkv) just a really CPU-heavy format? I can never get them to play correctly; in mplayer the audio is always out of sync and in vlc the video is unwatchably choppy.

This is on a 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo, which should be more than fast enough to play a video (right?).

If the mkv has high-resolution h.264 video it could conceivably take up all your CPU time.

Are you using mplayer from SVN? What type of video+audio is in this (these?) mkv file(s)?

# ? Jun 24, 2007 05:59

thenameseli: Sep 6, 2006

teapot posted:

code:

touch /forcefsck
reboot

Sorry for the delay, but that did not fix my problem. The file persists with the same issues.

I am fairly certain fsck is run; boot output shows:

code:

Will now check all file systems.
fsck 1.40-WIP (07-Apr-2007)
Checking all file systems.
Done checking file systems.

# ? Jun 24, 2007 06:04

teapot: Dec 27, 2003; by Fistgrrl

thenameseli posted:

Sorry for the delay, but that did not fix my problem. The file persists with the same issues.

I am fairly certain fsck is run; boot output shows:
code:
Will now check all file systems.
fsck 1.40-WIP (07-Apr-2007)
Checking all file systems.
Done checking file systems. 

This doesn't mean anything -- unless mount count or time between checks is exceeded, check is skipped if there is no /forcefsck file on a filesystem or filesystem is clean (what it always should be after replaying the log). Is this on / filesystem or somewhere else? What filesystem (ext3?) is it anyway? Does

code:

ls -ln foo

return something more readable?

# ? Jun 24, 2007 06:18

Al Azif: Nov 1, 2006

thenameseli posted:

If the mkv has high-resolution h.264 video it could conceivably take up all your CPU time.

Are you using mplayer from SVN? What type of video+audio is in this (these?) mkv file(s)?

It happens with pretty much every .mkv I've run into, but looking at them they all seem to be high-res h.264 with AC3 audio. So blame it on that, I guess.

I'm using Gentoo's mplayer package, which appears to pull it from SVN.

# ? Jun 24, 2007 12:01

Vulture Culture: Jul 14, 2003; I was never enjoying it. I only eat it for the nutrients.

Edit: Never mind, stupidly easy question

Vulture Culture fucked around with this message at 17:19 on Jun 24, 2007

# ? Jun 24, 2007 17:17

beuges: Jul 4, 2005; fluffy bunny butterfly broomstick

I've got a weird problem. Just set up a gentoo box - everything's been updated with the latest and greatest as of a day or two ago. The problem is, every time I restart my computer, my nameserver details in /etc/resolv.conf disappear.

Current contents is as follows:

code:

pornserver etc # cat resolv.conf
# Generated by net-scripts for interface eth0
domain dhiren.za.net

nameserver 66.18.68.1

However, every time I restart the computer, the nameserver entry is gone, and I have to add it in manually. Any ideas what might be causing it?

I'm running samba, squid, exim, courier-imap, apache and mysql.

# ? Jun 24, 2007 18:51

Smackbilly: Jan 3, 2001; What kind of a name is Pizza Organ! anyway?

beuges posted:

I've got a weird problem. Just set up a gentoo box - everything's been updated with the latest and greatest as of a day or two ago. The problem is, every time I restart my computer, my nameserver details in /etc/resolv.conf disappear.

Current contents is as follows:
code:
pornserver etc # cat resolv.conf
# Generated by net-scripts for interface eth0
domain dhiren.za.net

nameserver 66.18.68.1
However, every time I restart the computer, the nameserver entry is gone, and I have to add it in manually. Any ideas what might be causing it?

I'm running samba, squid, exim, courier-imap, apache and mysql.

It's being overwritten by your dhcp client. You need to edit your dhcp client config file for the interface question and add the line "append domain-name-servers 66.18.68.1". I can't remember where this file is on Gentoo, but on Fedora it's /etc/dhclient-eth0.conf (or replace eth0 with whichever interface).

If you need the "domain" line to appear as well, there are lots of other directives you can put in the dhcp client config file. man dhclient.conf

# ? Jun 24, 2007 19:06

decypher: Aug 23, 2003; Who else see da leprechaun say yaaaa!

I have a question about how iPods work in Linux, as I am new to it and need to update my library.

Is it safe?

How do you linux goons with iPods update your iPod? Is there a package that allows you to safely mount and unmount your iPod similar to how iTunes does it in Windows/OSX?

# ? Jun 25, 2007 02:45

Infereit: Dec 29, 2000

This might be a bit of a long shot, but I'm a newbie when it comes to linux administration and troubleshooting.

I've been doing some work in PostgreSQL 8.2, installed on Debian on a new machine- RAID10, redundant, transaction log on its own array etc. It was up and running fine for about a week, and then on Friday night, the power supply failed. No big deal, a new one got swapped in and the machine booted up fine.

Now when I try to start postgresql through pg_ctl, I get a message that the server is starting, but it doesn't appear to have actually started when I look at top or check the folder for postmaster.pid.

I'm basically doing this, which used to work:

su postgres
./pg_ctl -D /data/ start

console prints: "server starting"

No error is printed, and I don't know where to look for one.

Does anyone know enough about PostgreSQL to give me some suggestions or guidance?

# ? Jun 25, 2007 03:15

covener: Jan 10, 2004; You know, for kids!

decypher posted:

How do you linux goons with iPods update your iPod? Is there a package that allows you to safely mount and unmount your iPod similar to how iTunes does it in Windows/OSX?

http://www.gnu.org/software/gnupod/

mount, (1-time: gnupod_INIT). gnupod_addsong*, mktunes, umount, eject

# ? Jun 25, 2007 03:32

Infereit: Dec 29, 2000

Infereit posted:

This might be a bit of a long shot, but I'm a newbie when it comes to linux administration and troubleshooting.

I've been doing some work in PostgreSQL 8.2, installed on Debian on a new machine- RAID10, redundant, transaction log on its own array etc. It was up and running fine for about a week, and then on Friday night, the power supply failed. No big deal, a new one got swapped in and the machine booted up fine.

Now when I try to start postgresql through pg_ctl, I get a message that the server is starting, but it doesn't appear to have actually started when I look at top or check the folder for postmaster.pid.

I'm basically doing this, which used to work:

su postgres
./pg_ctl -D /data/ start

console prints: "server starting"

No error is printed, and I don't know where to look for one.

Does anyone know enough about PostgreSQL to give me some suggestions or guidance?

Nevermind. Found the problem- the shared memory SHMMAX kernel setting got reset to lower than the amount in the postgresql settings. Just had to up it to match.

# ? Jun 25, 2007 04:02

beuges: Jul 4, 2005; fluffy bunny butterfly broomstick

Smackbilly posted:

It's being overwritten by your dhcp client. You need to edit your dhcp client config file for the interface question and add the line "append domain-name-servers 66.18.68.1". I can't remember where this file is on Gentoo, but on Fedora it's /etc/dhclient-eth0.conf (or replace eth0 with whichever interface).

If you need the "domain" line to appear as well, there are lots of other directives you can put in the dhcp client config file. man dhclient.conf

I don't use dhcp - this box has a static address:

/etc/conf.d/net:

code:

pornserver ~ # more /etc/conf.d/net
# This blank configuration will automatically use DHCP for any net.*
# scripts in /etc/init.d.  To create a more complete configuration,
# please review /etc/conf.d/net.example and save your configuration
# in /etc/conf.d/net (this file :]!).

dns_domain_lo="dhiren.za.net"
dns_domain_eth0="dhiren.za.net"

config_eth0=( "192.168.1.69 netmask 255.255.255.0 brd 192.168.1.255" )
routes_eth0=( "default via 192.168.1.254" )

# ? Jun 25, 2007 10:00

Crusader: Apr 11, 2002

Al Azif posted:

It happens with pretty much every .mkv I've run into, but looking at them they all seem to be high-res h.264 with AC3 audio. So blame it on that, I guess.

I'm using Gentoo's mplayer package, which appears to pull it from SVN.

Try upping the cache (-cache blah) when using HD H.264 files; that stopped frame hitching on my old Athlon machine.

# ? Jun 25, 2007 15:04

Boner Buffet: Feb 16, 2006

Is there a command to barf out a list of the hardware running on a machine?

# ? Jun 25, 2007 16:24

JoeNotCharles: Mar 3, 2005; Yet beyond each tree there are only more trees.

InferiorWang posted:

Is there a command to barf out a list of the hardware running on a machine?

Try "lshal" or "lshw". lshal is a command-line interface to the modern Hardware Abstraction Layer, while lshw is black magic of some sort.

# ? Jun 25, 2007 16:29

Alowishus: Jan 8, 2002; My name is Mud

InferiorWang posted:

Is there a command to barf out a list of the hardware running on a machine?

Not necessarily a single one, but you can 'cat /proc/cpuinfo' to see the processor details, 'cat /proc/meminfo' for memory, and 'lspci' and 'lsusb' for onboard stuff and peripherals.

# ? Jun 25, 2007 16:34

The Merkinman: Apr 22, 2007; I sell only quality merkins. What is a merkin you ask? Why, it's a wig for your genitals!

The only thing keeping me from completely switching to Linux (Ubuntu) is 3ds Max.

I take it that even with WINE this still isn't possible? I don't see any WINE test results for 3ds Max 9 on Feisty Fawn, but I'm guessing it's still 'garbage'.

I was looking into VMWare, but that apparently doesn't yet support 3D graphics cards

Is there ANY way to run 3ds Max (not Maya/Blender) in Linux?

# ? Jun 26, 2007 18:04

Christobevii3: Jul 3, 2006

I'm in a linux class right now and covering bash commands. One of my assignments is asking me to do this:

Edit the bashrc file so that when you type "hello" and press enter into the command line that it will reply "how are you?". It suggests using the echo command. I am not getting enough information from the class though to figure out how to do this. Can someone point me in the right direction or just help me?

# ? Jun 26, 2007 20:02

yippee cahier: Mar 28, 2005

Christobevii3 posted:

I'm in a linux class right now and covering bash commands. One of my assignments is asking me to do this:

Edit the bashrc file so that when you type "hello" and press enter into the command line that it will reply "how are you?". It suggests using the echo command. I am not getting enough information from the class though to figure out how to do this. Can someone point me in the right direction or just help me?

Try reading the man page for 'alias'.

# ? Jun 26, 2007 20:40

Christobevii3: Jul 3, 2006

What man (main?) page? I don't see anything on aliases on the first page. I know how to make say x=alias "exit" and such, but not with text.

# ? Jun 26, 2007 23:42

superb0wr: Jun 2, 2004; funky

Christobevii3 posted:

What man (main?) page? I don't see anything on aliases on the first page. I know how to make say x=alias "exit" and such, but not with text.

man is a unix command that is short for "manual" and is one of the best ways to learn about commands. type 'man alias' at the command prompt and it will tell you all about a command that should make it easy to do your homework. Try 'man echo' if you need more help.

# ? Jun 26, 2007 23:55

piss explosion: Apr 2, 2005; I THINK MURDER AND BIGOTRY ARE FUNNY!!

Interesting yet annoying problem.. I need to copy some files from linux over to windows, so I logged in as root, mounted my windows drive with the fuse ntfsmount tool and started copying the files. It copies a few over and then prints in the console a wonderfully vague error:

** Message: Hit unexpected error "Unsupported operation" while doing a file operation.

I have no idea why it would copy a few over and then suddenly stop. The drive has about 30GB left, i'm logged in as root and the permissions are the same for all the files. I'm using ubuntu fiesty 7.04. Any ideas?

EDIT: Found the problem

installed the ntfs-3g mount type from synaptic, mounted the drive using that and all works well.

piss explosion fucked around with this message at 02:13 on Jun 27, 2007

# ? Jun 27, 2007 01:50

Skillo: Aug 3, 2003; Jesus is coming! Quick, everyone look busy!

So I'm running Ubuntu 7.04 and installed aMSN.

Downloaded a skin for it, the instructions told me to extract it to (quoting from memory, I'm not near the Linux machine now) /usr/skillo/aMsn/skins

Problem is, it won't let me copy anything to that folder. It says I don't have permission. Since I don't think I know any way to login as root, is there anything I can do to copy the files there?

# ? Jun 27, 2007 03:29

future ghost: Dec 5, 2005; Gun Saliva

^^^
While you can login as root after doing some voodoo, an easier GUI way is to open a terminal and type (assuming you're using gnome):

~$: sudo nautilus and hit enter.

A root nautilus window should open after a password prompt. Now you can copy the extracted files over to the aMSN folder specified.

You can also do this with the cli but the above should be easy enough.

# ? Jun 27, 2007 04:10

teapot: Dec 27, 2003; by Fistgrrl

The Merkinman posted:

The only thing keeping me from completely switching to Linux (Ubuntu) is 3ds Max.

I take it that even with WINE this still isn't possible? I don't see any WINE test results for 3ds Max 9 on Feisty Fawn, but I'm guessing it's still 'garbage'.

I was looking into VMWare, but that apparently doesn't yet support 3D graphics cards

Is there ANY way to run 3ds Max (not Maya/Blender) in Linux?

Apparently, Autodesk is Broadcom of software -- nothing that it made runs on Linux. Nevertheless, you can try to check if it works with VMWare 3d acceleration support: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=84344

# ? Jun 27, 2007 04:29

yippee cahier: Mar 28, 2005

Skillo posted:

So I'm running Ubuntu 7.04 and installed aMSN.

Downloaded a skin for it, the instructions told me to extract it to (quoting from memory, I'm not near the Linux machine now) /usr/skillo/aMsn/skins

Problem is, it won't let me copy anything to that folder. It says I don't have permission. Since I don't think I know any way to login as root, is there anything I can do to copy the files there?

If it's just you on the system, another option might be putting the skin in your user folder. Do you have a ~/.amsn/skins directory or something similar? Sorry, I use pidgin, I can't be of much help.

# ? Jun 27, 2007 04:46

Christobevii3: Jul 3, 2006

Skill use the cp function in command line along with the sudo account.

# ? Jun 27, 2007 07:46

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# ? Apr 24, 2024 00:19

invid: Dec 19, 2002

I'm trying to configure mrtg-mailstats for my server, and its telling me to find a sendmail.cf file, but for some reason, after doing a

code:

find / | grep sendmail.cf

I get no results.

Any idea how can I go about configuring mailstats?

# ? Jun 27, 2007 13:40

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Linux Questions Thread: a bunch of pitfalls, but technically it's possible

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